"If it should--if it should!" "What then?
Shall we not be happy together?
Will it not be even pleasant to remember these wretched years ?" "But if it should turn out so--oh, how can I ever be a fitting wife for you, how can I learn all that a great lady must think, and do, and say?
I shall be unworthy of you--of your new friends, of your new world--but then, it cannot really happen.

No--do not speak of it any more, it hurts me too much--good-night, good-night! Let us sleep and forget, and go back to our work in the morning, as though nothing had happened--in the morning, to-morrow.

Will you?
Then good-night." "There will be no work to-morrow," he said, returning to his argument.

But she broke away and fled from him and disappeared in the dark and narrow staircase.

As he stood, he could hear her light tread on the creaking wood of the steps, fainter and fainter in the distance.